Pros/Cons of Cruising Before a Relocation Cruise

[Red Bull Express]

I was curious if anyone has any experience cruising within a couple weeks of a relolcation cruise. And if anyone has noticed any advatages or disadvantages while doing so. Or if all services and the overall experience was just like any other cruise.

[Jimbo]

I was curious if anyone has any experience cruising within a couple weeks of a relolcation cruise. And if anyone has noticed any advatages or disadvantages while doing so. Or if all services and the overall experience was just like any other cruise.

 

No big disadvantage at all. Only thing you might see, which happens on alot of cruises, is some of the crew might be leaving at that same time for either vacations or some might be going to be changed for different ships.

 

Only real place you might notice is in the Dining room when they pair up waiters with assistant waiters and they aren't used to working together so things might be a little slow to they get used to each other.

 

I wouldn't worry about it.

 

It's called a Repositioning Cruise, not a relocation.

 

Jimbo:)

[cujosmom]

We did a 7 day Med Cruise prior to a TransAtlantic cruise (I guess you could consider that a "repositioning" cruise). It was great. If there was any "con" to it, it was that we had to change cabins but that's how we booked it in the first place and even that was easy.

[raw92378]

I did one for my Honeymoon. Was a reposition from San Juan, PR to Baltimore, MD.

 

I cannot say that I really noticed anything different from a 'normal' cruise.

 

The only problem we had was some engine trouble outside of Bermuda (the Atlantic was tough). Ended up arriving to the island late only to have more trouble the next day ultimately significantly delaying our arrival into Baltimore. Was due in around 7 or 8am and ended up not arriving until 1pm and not leaving the ship until close to 3pm as i remember it...

[bus man]

My cruise last fall on the Radiance was the first out of Tampa after she repositioned from Alaska. What struck me was the heavy turnover of the stateroom attendants and waiters; something like 50 percent of the attendants were new to the ship -- and it showed. While the service certainly wasn't bad by any means, it was definitely the "least good" of any cruise I've been on.

 

It does take some time for a crew to learn the ropes of their jobs, and learn to work together as a team. In a lot of ways, we, the passengers on my cruise, were the guinea pigs as the new crew got up to speed. In the future, I think I'll try and avoid cruises that immediately follow a repositioning.